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[This is part of a series exploring the Baseball Tarot. If you would like to prompt for a part of the game or a card from the deck, all the rest of the month is available for your curiosity, about either baseball or Tarot. Leave a comment with a prompt if you want in. All other comments are still welcome, of course.]
Many things in baseball are temporary. Each pitch represents the potential for something new and exciting, while building toward an eventual result that will pass one batter out of the box and bring the next one to the plate. Each batter gets a new count and a new situation, and the defense has to reset themselves accordingly.
Sometimes those situations end in a great triumph for the offense - a clutch hit, a home run, even a walk or a sacrifice at the right time can score the run needed to win the game. Working a tired pitcher or sitting on the right pitch at the right time can make for excellent results.
And sometimes... it doesn't happen at all. In situations where any kind of offense would help keep the rally going, add some insurance, break a tie...sometimes the batter gets nothing. They expected the wrong pitch, the bunt gets away from them, or they swing at something that looks good right before it nosedives away from them. If you hear a batter talk about that experience, you might hear them say "I choked."
Choking is still a subjective opinion - no statistics are kept on it, so there's no objective criteria, but generally someone will say they choked in a pressure situation, with the possibility of runs to be scored, and where their failure to get on base really had a bad impact on the game. The choke strongly implies that the situation could have been handled by the batter, but they let the pressure get to them and now the team is suffering as a result. If the pitcher has been preforming well, with good placement and velocity, striking or hitting into an out seems more like a foregone conclusion than a choke. If the entire team is struggling or having a difficult time, then it's not a choke, either, or that brush hits the entire team equally well.
Truthfully, though, the label of a choke tends to be given either by the person criticizing themselves and their own performance or the angry fanatics whose enjoyment of the game is disrupted by the way the game is unfolding. Those fans lash out at what they see as missed opportunities during the game to win it. Sometimes they wait until after the game to show their discontent, and sometimes they vent that frustration at the retreating players while the game is still going.
Interestingly, there is an entirely different context where a player can choke, and it is a good thing to do. A player facing a pitcher throwing at higher velocities than expected, a pitcher with sharply breaking pitches, a player with two strikes looking to foul off anything that resembles a third strike, or any player looking to increase their bat speed to try and collect a hit will often place their grip higher on the bat than they would normally. By "choking up" on the bat, they essentially create a shorter bat to swing, allowing the hitter to put the bat through the strike zone faster. Choking up trades power for speed, changing the mental state from one looking to hit for extra bases or home runs to one looking to get a hit any way possible, or at least foul off pitches until drawing a walk or a good pitch to hit. It's still possible to choke while choked up, of course, but choking up is a way of trying to avoid that particular problem.
If you're the hitter and this card shows up, now is a good time to admit that the pressure is getting to you. You're either worried about making bad decisions, in the process of making a bad one, or regretting a decision made under pressure. If you can, call time and clear your head. Maybe even have a short talk with the coach about what's going on and see if you can get some advice about the next pitch. Choke up on the bat when you dig in again. The calmer you can be going into the next pitch, the less likely you are to feel like you choked if things don't turn out well. And you might be calm enough to notice something that will help you get on base instead.
If you're the pitcher that serves up something and the hitter chokes on it, understand your good fortune and move on. Trying to go back to the well or to pull the same routine again is likely to end up very, very differently, as many players don't have the same pressure problems the next time around. Better, instead, to have sympathy and empathy for the person who cracked in the pressure situation, because it won't be too long before it's you who is accused of having cracked under pressure.
Ultimately, though, while a choke is horribly embarrassing and will earn you some scorn from the fans and a ribbing from your teammates, it is ultimately temporary. Baseball always resets itself with every pitch, every batter, every game. The same thing that prevents advantages from snowballing to one team or another also means that disadvantages well also dissipate fairly quickly.
In that respect, though, baseball does not reflect the real world, where many benefits of privilege work to accrue advantages to companies and people who already stay out with advantages. If baseball is supposed to be the pastime of the United States, it would do better for our lives to emulate the egalitarian idea of baseball.
And yes, contemplation of the idea of the multimillion dollar salaries, the multibillion dollar anti-trust-exempted business that is Major League Baseball, and the way that sports are often presented as one of the few ways the underprivileged or those of non-white skin can accumulate money is a worthwhile thing, especially when comparing it to the baseball played in the learning ages and by amateurs and weekend players.
Many things in baseball are temporary. Each pitch represents the potential for something new and exciting, while building toward an eventual result that will pass one batter out of the box and bring the next one to the plate. Each batter gets a new count and a new situation, and the defense has to reset themselves accordingly.
Sometimes those situations end in a great triumph for the offense - a clutch hit, a home run, even a walk or a sacrifice at the right time can score the run needed to win the game. Working a tired pitcher or sitting on the right pitch at the right time can make for excellent results.
And sometimes... it doesn't happen at all. In situations where any kind of offense would help keep the rally going, add some insurance, break a tie...sometimes the batter gets nothing. They expected the wrong pitch, the bunt gets away from them, or they swing at something that looks good right before it nosedives away from them. If you hear a batter talk about that experience, you might hear them say "I choked."
Choking is still a subjective opinion - no statistics are kept on it, so there's no objective criteria, but generally someone will say they choked in a pressure situation, with the possibility of runs to be scored, and where their failure to get on base really had a bad impact on the game. The choke strongly implies that the situation could have been handled by the batter, but they let the pressure get to them and now the team is suffering as a result. If the pitcher has been preforming well, with good placement and velocity, striking or hitting into an out seems more like a foregone conclusion than a choke. If the entire team is struggling or having a difficult time, then it's not a choke, either, or that brush hits the entire team equally well.
Truthfully, though, the label of a choke tends to be given either by the person criticizing themselves and their own performance or the angry fanatics whose enjoyment of the game is disrupted by the way the game is unfolding. Those fans lash out at what they see as missed opportunities during the game to win it. Sometimes they wait until after the game to show their discontent, and sometimes they vent that frustration at the retreating players while the game is still going.
Interestingly, there is an entirely different context where a player can choke, and it is a good thing to do. A player facing a pitcher throwing at higher velocities than expected, a pitcher with sharply breaking pitches, a player with two strikes looking to foul off anything that resembles a third strike, or any player looking to increase their bat speed to try and collect a hit will often place their grip higher on the bat than they would normally. By "choking up" on the bat, they essentially create a shorter bat to swing, allowing the hitter to put the bat through the strike zone faster. Choking up trades power for speed, changing the mental state from one looking to hit for extra bases or home runs to one looking to get a hit any way possible, or at least foul off pitches until drawing a walk or a good pitch to hit. It's still possible to choke while choked up, of course, but choking up is a way of trying to avoid that particular problem.
If you're the hitter and this card shows up, now is a good time to admit that the pressure is getting to you. You're either worried about making bad decisions, in the process of making a bad one, or regretting a decision made under pressure. If you can, call time and clear your head. Maybe even have a short talk with the coach about what's going on and see if you can get some advice about the next pitch. Choke up on the bat when you dig in again. The calmer you can be going into the next pitch, the less likely you are to feel like you choked if things don't turn out well. And you might be calm enough to notice something that will help you get on base instead.
If you're the pitcher that serves up something and the hitter chokes on it, understand your good fortune and move on. Trying to go back to the well or to pull the same routine again is likely to end up very, very differently, as many players don't have the same pressure problems the next time around. Better, instead, to have sympathy and empathy for the person who cracked in the pressure situation, because it won't be too long before it's you who is accused of having cracked under pressure.
Ultimately, though, while a choke is horribly embarrassing and will earn you some scorn from the fans and a ribbing from your teammates, it is ultimately temporary. Baseball always resets itself with every pitch, every batter, every game. The same thing that prevents advantages from snowballing to one team or another also means that disadvantages well also dissipate fairly quickly.
In that respect, though, baseball does not reflect the real world, where many benefits of privilege work to accrue advantages to companies and people who already stay out with advantages. If baseball is supposed to be the pastime of the United States, it would do better for our lives to emulate the egalitarian idea of baseball.
And yes, contemplation of the idea of the multimillion dollar salaries, the multibillion dollar anti-trust-exempted business that is Major League Baseball, and the way that sports are often presented as one of the few ways the underprivileged or those of non-white skin can accumulate money is a worthwhile thing, especially when comparing it to the baseball played in the learning ages and by amateurs and weekend players.
